War with Japan

Tensions between Japan and the United States were rising in the prewar era. Due to Japn's actions in China and Machuria, FDR has frozen all Japanese assets. He knew if he made some sort of embargo that entirely restricted oil to Japan. But an embargo was devasting to Japan they were reliant on the nited States for about 80% of their oil. After failed  diplomatic discussions, Japan took action against the U.S. through an attack on Pearl Harbor setting off US conflict with Japan. Therefore, it is plausable that even without conflict in Germany, Teh United States would have engaged in war in Japan.

Immigration- Current Issue

A current event that I feel is handled based on assumptions is immigration, from Mexico to United States, especially illegal immigration. Many politicains have toyed with the proposition of giving amnesty to illegal immigrants, and many have assumed that is a faulty plan because people assume that giving any sort of rights to illegal aliens will simply spure a rise in illegal immigration because it will give people hope of a better life in America. I don't jump to this conclusion because I believe that many of the people living in America without citizenship are hard working, tax paynig citizens who have made their way in the United States. I believe that this sort of amnesty needs to be accompanied by an immigration reform, giving people an oppurtunity to apply for a green card in the short term, instead of making it expensive and virtually unattainable for people to recieve. I think that our country cannot overlook the benficial economic effect of immigrants in our country, and they make up the equivalent of the population of Pennsylvania. I don't think we can overlook their contribution to our country.

Martin Gilbert (80-98)

Russia eventually abandoned the war cause because of political instability, why do you think they waited so lonog and lost so many soliders before they opted to pull out of the war?

The Technology contibuting to the outcome of World War 1

The new technologies created before and during the first World war had a signigficant impact on the outcome of the war. They also lead up to the atrocities of the second world war.
        Most of the new technologies made were weapons. These weapons had a logical idea, but were not maniuplated to be as effective as they could have been. Also, many of these new inventions were new and not widely available of renewable. An example would be gas. Gas use was introduced early on in the war, during trench warfare, and was used on both sides of the war. Types of gas such as chorene gas and phosgene, which could paralyze and kill soliders and wipe out mass amounts of tropps in a matter of minutes.
 Gas was definately a game changer, the downside was  that neither sides had enough resources to keep up with gas attacks, so they would lose the ground that they gained.
Transportation technologies such as airplanes, tanks and armored ships gained prominance. The German- Uboat use aslo influenced the United States decision on entering the war. Airplanes were intially used as a way of spying, and later manipulated to drop bombs, setting the stage for the airplane warfare which would define the combat of World War 2. Tanks were new and not used to their full capability.

The new technology especially effected the war by increasing the causality numbers monumentally, bu also contributed to the stalemate, when both sides were equally equpit with the same about of new type of technology.

Historiography of World War l

Sideney Bradshaw Fay, The Origins of the World War (1928)

Fay made his interpretation of the World War in the 1920's, a time when the revisionalist perspective was popular. The Revisionalist perspective reevaluated the Orthodox perspective of looking at how blame was distributed after the first world war. So, with WWl, the Orthodox interpretation originally placed the most blame on Germany, and served as a sort of justification for the Treaty of Versaille. Fay's revisionalist view contradicted the Orthodox view and asserted that Germany was not the primary country to blame, infact other countries, or to an extent most all European countries, shared responsibilty, as a result of actions that failed to take, that could have prevented war. I agree most with this perspective, despite the fact that it rests alot upon hypothetic situations.

Germany was not the sole country to blame for the First World War. Germany did not want a World War, but evidence does support that Germany wanted a localized conflict between Serbia and Austira Hungary. However, other countries such as Great Britatin, could have had a large role in preventing war. Britain could have threatened Germany, or told France they would not intevene, so that France would stop Russia, inorder to produce a localized conflict, and not a war on a world scale. France's responsibility on stopping the war could have consisted of asking Russia to not get involved, instead of doing everything to just strenghten their alliance. Russia was also ambigous, they had supported Serbian unity in the end. They had convinced Austria-Hungary that they may intervene, which wouldn't have produced a localized conflict. Austrian-Hungarian leaders, influenced by Germany did not make a distinction between Serbia as a country, versus Serbian nationalists. Germany supported them, to support their own alliance, and they did not want to be alone and isolated. This is why I believe that many countries shared responsiblity.

Forces driving MAIN during WWl

Imperialism:
 The imperalistic policies of Germany, Austria-Hungary, Great Britain, France, Russia and many other countries played a big role in driving WWI. France and Great Britain had established many colonies throughout Africa and Asia, and Germany was late in the game and only had a few colonies in Africa. Germany needed a way to one up, and Germany's plan to keep up with it's European rivals was to gain more territory.

Militarism:
To gain more territory, Germany needed to build up its army as a way of asserting power. Germany needed to build up a massive army, as well as a massive navy to keep up with Britain. This sparked an arms race, countries throughout the world started preparing for war. German began to prepare for war with the Schieffen plan, although this plan relyed alot upon "what ifs",proabaly why it didnt work out so well.

Nationalism: In order to raise funds and recruit to suport the militarist movement, a nationalist sentiment was spread throughout many countries, including Germany, where the idea of a war on German terms was encourages. Nationalism lead to extreme pride in ones country, an may have been a way to validate unethical imperalist pratices.

Alliances: Alliances were made between countries either to keep the peace, or to ensure some sort of military back up during conflict. In the end these alliances ended up contractually dragging many nations into a war that didn't benefit them.